Eco-innovation is the development of products and processes that contribute to

sustainable development Sustainable development is an organizing principle for meeting human development goals while also sustaining the ability of natural systems to provide the natural resources and ecosystem services on which the economy and society depend. The des ...

, applying the commercial application of knowledge to elicit direct or indirect ecological improvements. This includes a range of related ideas, from

environmentally friendly Environment friendly processes, or environmental-friendly processes (also referred to as eco-friendly, nature-friendly, and green), are sustainability and marketing terms referring to goods and services, laws, guidelines and policies that clai ...

technological advances to socially acceptable innovative paths towards

sustainability Specific definitions of sustainability are difficult to agree on and have varied in the literature and over time. The concept of sustainability can be used to guide decisions at the global, national, and individual levels (e.g. sustainable livi ...

. The field of research that seeks to explain how, why, and at what rate new "ecological"

idea In common usage and in philosophy, ideas are the results of thought. Also in philosophy, ideas can also be mental representational images of some object. Many philosophers have considered ideas to be a fundamental ontological category of being ...

s and

technology Technology is the application of knowledge to reach practical goals in a specifiable and reproducible way. The word ''technology'' may also mean the product of such an endeavor. The use of technology is widely prevalent in medicine, science, ...

spread is called

eco-innovation diffusion Diffusion of innovations is a theory that seeks to explain how, why, and at what rate new ideas and technology spread. Everett Rogers, a professor of communication studies, popularized the theory in his book ''Diffusion of Innovations''; the boo ...

Concept

The idea of eco-innovation is fairly recent. One of the first appearances in the literature was in a book by Claude Fussler and Peter James. In a subsequent article, Peter James defined eco-innovation as "new products and processes which provide customer and business value but significantly decrease environmental impacts".James, P., 1997; 'The Sustainability Circle: a new tool for product development and design', ''Journal of Sustainable Product Design'' 2: 52:57, http://www.cfsd.org.uk/journal Klaus Rennings employs the term eco-innovation to describe three kinds of changes related to sustainable development: technological, social and institutional innovation. Eco-innovation is sometimes called "environmental innovation", and is often linked with

environmental technology Environmental technology (envirotech) or green technology (greentech), also known as ''clean technology'' (''cleantech''), is the application of one or more of environmental science, green chemistry, environmental monitoring and electronic device ...

eco-efficiency As countries and regions around the world began to develop, it slowly became evident that industrialization and economic growth come hand in hand with environmental degradation. Eco-efficiency has been proposed as one of the main tools to promote a ...

eco-design Ecological design or ecodesign is an approach to designing products and services that gives special consideration to the environmental impacts of a product over its entire lifecycle. Sim Van der Ryn and Stuart Cowan define it as "any form of d ...

, environmental design,

sustainable design Environmentally sustainable design (also called environmentally conscious design, eco-design, etc.) is the philosophy of designing physical objects, the built environment, and services to comply with the principles of ecological sustainability ...

, or

sustainable innovation Specific definitions of sustainability are difficult to agree on and have varied in the literature and over time. The concept of sustainability can be used to guide decisions at the global, national, and individual levels (e.g. sustainable livin ...

. While the term "environmental innovation" is used in similar contexts to "eco-innovation", the other terms are mostly used when referring to product or process design, and when the focus is more on the technological aspects of eco-innovation rather than the societal and political aspects. Ecovation is the process by which business adopts ecological innovation to create products which have a generative nature and are recyclable.

As a technological term

The most common usage of the term "eco-innovation" is to refer to innovative products and processes that reduce environmental impacts, whether the main motivation for their development or deployment is environmental or not. This is often used in conjunction with eco-efficiency and eco-design. Leaders in many industries have been developing innovative technologies in order to work towards

. However, these are not always practical, or enforced by policy and legislation.

As a social process

Another position held (for example, by the organisatio
Eco Innovation
is that this definition should be complemented: eco-innovations should also bring greater social and cultural acceptance. In this view, this "social pillar" added to James's definition is necessary because it determines learning and the effectiveness of eco-innovations. This approach gives eco-innovations a social component, a status that is more than a new type of commodity, or a new sector, even though

and eco-innovation are associated with the emergence of new economic activities or even branches (e.g., waste treatment,

recycling Recycling is the process of converting waste materials into new materials and objects. The recovery of energy from waste materials is often included in this concept. The recyclability of a material depends on its ability to reacquire the p ...

, etc.). This approach considers eco-innovation in terms of usage rather than merely in terms of product. The social pillar associated with eco-innovation introduces a governance component that makes eco-innovation a more integrated tool for

Examples

Geothermal power Geothermal power is electrical power generated from geothermal energy. Technologies in use include dry steam power stations, flash steam power stations and binary cycle power stations. Geothermal electricity generation is currently used in 2 ...

– utitialised through technology such as

dry steam power station Geothermal power is electricity generation, electrical power generated from geothermal energy. Technologies in use include dry steam power stations, flash steam power stations and binary cycle power stations. Geothermal electricity generation ...

s, flash steam power stations and

binary cycle power station A binary cycle is a method for generating electrical power from geothermal resources and employs two separate fluid cycles, hence binary cycle. The primary cycle extracts the geothermal energy from the reservoir, and secondary cycle converts the he ...

s. *

Hydropower Hydropower (from el, ὕδωρ, "water"), also known as water power, is the use of falling or fast-running water to Electricity generation, produce electricity or to power machines. This is achieved by energy transformation, converting the Pot ...

– utitialised through technology such as

hydroelectric dam Hydroelectricity, or hydroelectric power, is electricity generated from hydropower (water power). Hydropower supplies one sixth of the world's electricity, almost 4500 TWh in 2020, which is more than all other renewable sources combined and ...

s. *

Solar power Solar power is the conversion of energy from sunlight into electricity, either directly using photovoltaics (PV) or indirectly using concentrated solar power. Photovoltaic cells convert light into an electric current using the photovoltaic e ...

– utitialised through technology such as

solar panel A solar cell panel, solar electric panel, photo-voltaic (PV) module, PV panel or solar panel is an assembly of photovoltaic solar cells mounted in a (usually rectangular) frame, and a neatly organised collection of PV panels is called a photo ...

s. *

Tidal power Tidal power or tidal energy is harnessed by converting energy from tides into useful forms of power, mainly electricity using various methods. Although not yet widely used, tidal energy has the potential for future electricity generation. Ti ...

– utitialised through technology such as tidal barrages and

tidal stream generator A tidal stream generator, often referred to as a tidal energy converter (TEC), is a machine that extracts energy from moving masses of water, in particular tides, although the term is often used in reference to machines designed to extract energy ...

s. *

Wind power Wind power or wind energy is mostly the use of wind turbines to electricity generation, generate electricity. Wind power is a popular, sustainable energy, sustainable, renewable energy source that has a much smaller Environmental impact of wi ...

– utitialised through technology such as

wind turbine A wind turbine is a device that converts the kinetic energy of wind into electrical energy. Hundreds of thousands of large turbines, in installations known as wind farms, now generate over 650 gigawatts of power, with 60 GW added each year. ...

Diffusion

Literature in the field of eco-innovations often focuses on policy, regulations, technology, market and firm specific factors rather than

diffusion Diffusion is the net movement of anything (for example, atoms, ions, molecules, energy) generally from a region of higher concentration to a region of lower concentration. Diffusion is driven by a gradient in Gibbs free energy or chemical p ...

. However, understanding of

diffusion of eco-innovations Diffusion of innovations is a theory that seeks to explain how, why, and at what rate new ideas and technology spread. Everett Rogers, a professor of communication studies, popularized the theory in his book ''Diffusion of Innovations''; the book ...

recently has gained more importance given the fact that some eco-innovations are already at a mature stage. Survey research shows that most customers hold positive attitudes towards various types of eco-innovations. At the same time, adoption rates of solutions such as dynamic electricity tariffs remain unsatisfactorily low. The "Not In My Back Yard" (NIMBY) concept is often used to describe what at first seems to be a confusing intention-behavior gap between high levels of public support for eco-innovations and frequent non-engagement or even local hostility towards specific project proposals. Social psychology and economic behavior models could and should be used to overcome these challenges. According to theory on the diffusion on innovation different adopters of innovation can be in different stages of acceptance. Research on eco-innovations in the construction sector reveals that for eco-innovations to gain acceptance among B2B actors, in addition to having a reduced environmental footprint, they need to demonstrate improved efficiency, create new market opportunities, and help to change the mindset from the traditional mass production to that of creating value. Hence, for such innovations to diffuse in a larger market they need to address industry-specific problems, and not simply act as a substitute for an existing technology.

References

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External links

Eco-innovation: Potentials and challenges of tomorrow's technologies (conference held in Copenhagen 2005)Environmental technologies Action Plan (ETAP)
A

European Commission The European Commission (EC) is the executive of the European Union (EU). It operates as a cabinet government, with 27 members of the Commission (informally known as "Commissioners") headed by a President. It includes an administrative body o ...

initiative: *
What is ecoinnovation?
( EnviroWindows-

European Environment Agency The European Environment Agency (EEA) is the agency of the European Union (EU) which provides independent information on the environment. Definition The European Environment Agency (EEA) is the agency of the European Union (EU) which provides i ...

). *
European Funding programme for SMEs who want to put an Eco-Innovation on the European market
Bright green environmentalism Design Innovation economics Innovation Product management Product development Science and technology studies Sustainable technologies

Concept

As a technological term

As a social process

Examples

Diffusion

See also

References

External links